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BEIJING — China on Wednesday issued a $50 billion list of U.S. goods including soybeans and small aircraft for possible tariff hikes in an escalating and potentially damaging technology dispute with Washington.

The country's tax agency gave no date for the 25 percent increase to take effect and said that will depend on what President Donald Trump does about U.S. plans to raise duties on a similar amount of Chinese goods.

MOSCOW — Top Russian defense and security officials on Wednesday launched diatribes at the West, accusing it of fomenting a new Cold War in a bid to retain waning influence in global affairs.

Moscow used an annual security conference attended by top defense officials from Asia, Africa and Latin America to harshly criticize the U.S. and its allies, accusing them of putting global stability at risk.

MANBIJ, Syria (AP) — A week ago, there was just a single house where U.S. soldiers had hoisted an American flag on a hill not far from a tense front line in Syria.

On Wednesday, there was a growing fortified position with a perimeter of large sand barriers and barbed wire, a new watch tower and a halfdozen armored vehicles.

Even as U.S. President Donald Trump spoke of pulling out of Syria “very soon,” an Associated Press team saw American forces setting up front-line positions outside the strategic northern town of Manbij, west of the Euphrates River.

MOSCOW (AP) — An aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday that U.S. President Donald Trump invited the Russian leader to the White House when they spoke by telephone last month, but the two countries haven't started any preparations for such a visit.

Trump and Putin had a telephone conversation on March 20 in which Trump congratulated Putin on winning the Russian presidential election two days earlier. The White House and the Kremlin said at the time the two presidents discussed meeting in person.

Scientists monitoring the craft's disintegrating orbit had forecast the craft would mostly burn up and would pose only the slightest of risks to people. Analysis from the Beijing Aerospace Control Center showed it had mostly burned up.

BEIJING (AP) — China raised import duties on a $3 billion list of U.S. pork, apples and other products Monday in an escalating dispute with Washington over trade and industrial policy.

The government of President Xi Jinping said it was responding to a U.S. tariff hike on steel and aluminum. But that is just one facet of sprawling tensions with Washington, Europe and Japan over a state-led economic model they complain hampers market access, protects Chinese companies and subsidizes exports in violation of Beijing’s free-trade commitments.

LONDON (AP) — Britain’s exit from the European Union has been likened to putting toothpaste back in the tube. But it’s more like trying to separate the fluoride from the paste: complicated and messy.

Thursday marks 365 days until Britain officially leaves the EU. The March 29, 2019, departure will end a 46-year marriage that has entwined the economies, legal systems and peoples of Britain and 27 other European countries.

British Prime Minister Theresa May was on a whistle-stop tour of the United Kingdom’s four corners to promise a Brexit that unites the country.

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia announced the expulsion of more than 150 diplomats, including 60 Americans, on Thursday and said it was closing a U.S. consulate in retaliation for the wave of Western expulsions of Russian diplomats over the poisoning of an ex-spy and his daughter in Britain, a tit-for-tat response that intensified the Kremlin’s rupture with the United States and Europe.

The Russian move came as a hospital treating Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, said the woman was improving rapidly and was out of critical condition, though her father remained in critical condition.

BEIJING — With smiles and firm handshakes, North Korea and China used a surprise summit this week to show that despite recent tensions, Pyongyang still has a powerful backer and Beijing will not be sidelined in discussions about the fate of its unpredictable neighbor.

BEIJING (AP) — A mysterious armored train made a round trip from North Korea to Beijing without revealing its key secret: Was Kim Jong Un on board?

Speculation about a visit to Beijing by North Korea's reclusive leader or another high-level Pyongyang official ran high Tuesday amid talk of preparations for a meeting between Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump.